"Congress should stop this sneak attack on the American public," said Michael Jacobson,
executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI). "The food industry is
hiding in the shadow of unrelated legislation so it can slip anti-consumer provisions into law at the
last minute. The Senate let them get away with it but the House should not." A House of
Representatives committee is scheduled to vote on the bill this week.

The bill removes the requirement that irradiated food be prominently marked with a symbol and
words. Instead, manufacturers can hide the fact that food has been irradiated in tiny print on the
back of the package. Over 92 percent of American consumers want irradiated food to be clearly
labeled, according to a 1996 poll conducted by Bruskin/Goldring Research.

"Congress should realize that hiding the fact that foods have been irradiated will only fuel
consumer skepticism about irradiation," said Carol Tucker Foreman, former Assistant Secretary
of Agriculture. "Passage of this legislation will garner for Congress the same level of disrespect
that came from hiding the $50 billion tobacco tax credit."

The bill also could open the door to a flood of misleading new health claims on food labels by
eliminating a requirement that such claims be pre-approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
This measure, which has been opposed by a broad coalition of health groups, is an attempt to
weaken the landmark Nutrition Labeling and Education Act (NLEA).

"This provision is a serious disservice to the health of the American people," said Bruce
Silverglade. "It will turn back the clock to the days before passage of the NLEA, when food
labels made confusing and deceptive claims about health benefits."

CSPI is a nonprofit, consumer organization, based in Washington, DC. It is supported largely
by more than 900,000 subscribers to Nutrition Action Healthletter. CSPI led the drive for the
current law that requires nutrition information on almost all food labels in the U.S. and set
standards for health and nutrition claims on labels.